Why can't I throw an exception while using the ternary operator

Question

This doesn\'t compile and gives the following error : Illegal start of expression. Why?

public static AppConfig getInstance() {
        return mConf         


        

Answer 1

In case it's helpful to someone, here is an answer using java 8+ Optional:

public static AppConfig getInstance() {
    return Optional.ofNullable(mConfig).orElseThrow(() -> new RuntimeException("error"));
}